Georgia (USA) makes abortion punishable by life imprisonment.

[Oldstyle]

New legislation HB 481 only allows abortion up to 6 weeks. It has massive consequences for women who get abortions from doctors or miscarry. A woman who seeks out an illegal abortion from a health care provider would be a party to murder, subject to life in prison. And a woman who miscarries because of her own conduct—say, using drugs or alcohol while pregnant—would be liable for second-degree murder, punishable by 10 to 30 years’ imprisonment. Prosecutors may interrogate women who miscarry to determine whether they can be held responsible; if they find evidence of culpability, they may charge, detain, and try these women for the death of their fetuses.

Even women who seek lawful abortions out of state may not escape punishment. If a Georgia resident plans to travel elsewhere to obtain an abortion, she may be charged with conspiracy to commit murder, punishable by 10 years’ imprisonment. An individual who helps a woman plan her trip to get an out-of-state abortion, or transports her to the clinic, may also be charged with conspiracy to end of the life of a “person” with “full legal recognition” under Georgia law.

This is a shocking assault on women's health, autonomy and reproductive rights. The intention to 'interrogate' women who miscarry to check for 'blame' is inhuman. Apparently 28 other states are intending to follow Georgia's lead.

Seems like the only option for American women is to refuse any sex which could impregnate them unless they're wanting to conceive. The only reproductive right they seem to be being left is the right to say 'no'. (They do still have that right?)

So alarming and regressive. The only hope is that I think that this isn’t due to come into force until January, so hopefully they’re is some chance of a legal challenge

They can say no. Doesn't mean they will get listened too.

Women who have incomplete or complicated miscarriages, ectopic pregnancies, etc are going to die because of this. Out of fear of being investigated and charged, they will avoid medical attention.

It is going to undoubtedly discriminate against the underprivileged who don’t have “connections” or the legal funds. You think a state senators daughter or wife would be subject to scrutiny if they miscarry or “travel out of state”?

The state will have the death of many more women like Savita Halappanavar on their hands.

How terrifying. Under his eye.

America has gone completely nuts, this is terrifying :(

America is a truly repulsive excuse for a country.

In Ohio, they also want to try to remove and re-implant an ectopic pregnancy. Which is not possible.
And they also want to reformulate the contraceptive pill so it cannot trigger an abortion. so this could mean that the coil is made illegal.

www.statenews.org/post/ohio-legislature-considering-abortion-bill-more-restrictive-heartbeat-bill

twitter.com/JessicaValenti/status/1126165928377405440

twitter.com/DrDGrossman/status/1126201292886437889

Oh. My. God. Seriously?!

Poor women.

This is horrific, Handmaid’s Tale stuff!

Absolutely awful. Men utterly denying women bodily autonomy and forcing them to have unwanted pregnancies.

Whilst presumably continuing to have all the sex they feel they are entitled to.

I'd like to pass a law on them forcing the father to pay a pregnant woman upfront say 20% of the average lifetime cost of a raising a child. Abortion restrictions would vanish overnight.

Shit.

I had a termination at 7 weeks. It was a planned, wanted pregnancy but due to pregnancy associated illness my physical and mental health could not stand me continuing the pregnancy without risk of long term complications. I have no doubt it would not be considered “necessary” under these draconian laws as my life was not imminently in danger. It was the hardest decision my husband and I ever made and no one other than my parents know the truth of it. To not even have that option, or face interrogation for evidence of mourner for something we already found heartbreaking is unbelievably cruel.
And what about those women who miscarry but continued drinking alcohol etc before they realised they were pregnant?
Even by USA standards this is abhorrent.

That's disgusting. As someone said, this will cause deaths. At six weeks you might not even have known you are pregnant!

@Antibles I'd support that law

And this on twitter today.
I'm sick of ignorant politicians who know F all about biology and medicine setting the agenda for medical procedures.
(Quite apart from the rights issues etc).

twitter.com/celticfeminist/status/1126155351064227840?s=21

X posted with Muststopfaffing

That's ridiculous about ectopic pregnancies. I'm sure if it was that easy women who desperately wanted a baby and had an ectopic would want to have that done.

The cost of this law to the state will be huge, surely? With everyone who has a miscarriage facing investigation, the caseload will be huge. Also, I can imagine women not telling doctors about their pregnancies until the second trimester, thus missing out on important antenatal care, just in case they miscarry.

Imagine if the same effort and money was going into preventing and punishing rape. Not only would that have the knock-on effect of reducing abortions but it would make society so much better. These regressive, terrifying, hateful, misogynistic laws will cause so much suffering. I can’t understand how this is happening.

I’m thinking back to myself with an unwanted pregnancy at age 19. I couldn’t access abortion in the country we lived in at that time, so had to travel six hours by car to a different country. That was bad enough. To have the terror of knowing I could spend my life in jail for doing the above is almost impossible to imagine. This is going to kill women and girls. There are young girls in backward very conservative religions American families who will kill them selves as they will feel that is a better option for them. I know this for a fact because that’s how I felt.

CarolDanvers

I had an abortion at 16. Not easy to organize at that age I was “lucky” that I was regular and sort of “knew” and tested before I was late. I started the process to get an abortion right away and it still was not done until I was over two months along because of all the things that had to line up, including appointments out of my control.

6 weeks? That is only two weeks after a missed period, because of how the dating works from LMP, assuming someone is regular. I too would have been inclined then to kill myself if I could not get an abortion.

Will doctors be obliged to report women? If so, I can see women who are miscarrying choosing not to seek medical attention. Women will die as a result of this.

This has made me think of some kind of horrific dystopian novel - I just can’t believe this is happening.

In 2012/13 several US states tried to bring in draconian bills of this sort, I think most of them failed then.

It's profoundly depressing that the time is right for this now.